


oh, mrs potato head tell me, (does a new face come with a warranty?)

by aleccbanes



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/F, F/M, goes from pre series to 3x02, minor self harm (hair pulling/scratching), not sure if retelling sara's death counts as major character death or not, primarily introspective felicity piece, written pre-4x13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-07
Updated: 2016-11-07
Packaged: 2018-08-29 15:12:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8494786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aleccbanes/pseuds/aleccbanes
Summary: She is eight years old, and her father is gone.She sits on a stool at the Grand, hair tied back tight and glasses slipping down her nose as she leans over a book.“Jesus.” She hears one of the regular patrons say, “I’m surprised Donna can even look at her, she looks so much like him.”The hair-tie snaps painfully against her wrist as Felicity lets her hair down. She won’t let them see her cry.Or:The one in which Felicity suffers heartbreak after heartbreak. And in the aftermath she changes herself out of a belief that it's something wrong with her that makes everybody leave.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this late last year and am still pretty happy with it so i figured i might as well post it here!
> 
> Originally posted on my tumblr @bisexualmbane - come say hi!

She is six years old, and her hair is brown.

It’s a dark, rich colour that falls to her lower back in untameable curls; framing her round, rosy cheeks and bright eyes.  In her fluttering white dress she looks like a nymph or a pixie, wild and beautiful and free.

Her hair trails behind her like a windblown curtain as she runs through their house, her laughter catching in the ringlets before echoing down the hallway behind her. When a deeper laugh follows she runs a little faster, laughter nearly getting lost in panted breaths.  

Darting up the stairs and down to her room, she quickly slams the door after her as she darts behind the large pink storage box that houses all her spare computer parts. Resisting the urge to get some out and tinker with them, she draws her knees to her chest, hair pooling around her with her dress; and she waits.

After a moment the door opens and he steps into the room. She stays silent and unmoving, but the familiar ache of immobility has already begun to settle in her small bones. She digs her nails into her legs, bites her lip, and tenses her body. She has to stay still. She can’t let him find her.

“Fe-li-ci-tyyy.” He says in a sing-song voice. She extracts one hand from her leg to clamp it over her smiling mouth. “Where are youu.”

“Hmmm.” She hears him say, “Where _has_ my menace of a daughter got to? Doesn’t she know dinner’s almost ready?”

If it wasn’t for her hand fixed upon her mouth, Felicity’s scoff would have escaped her. Dinner won’t be ready for another hour; when Mom gets home to regale them with tales of her day at the Grand.

What an amateur, Felicity thinks; stifling her laughter. She’s practically vibrating, caught up in her own amusement.

So much so that she doesn’t even notice-

“Gotcha!” Her father shouts, lifting her up by the armpits as she squeals indignantly, “The Smoak house monster strikes again! Trapping yet another little girl with promises of dinner! Will the police ever stop him? I certainly don’t think so!”

He throws his head back and laughs manically then; hoisting Felicity onto his hip as her resolve finally fails; giggles mingling with her father’s exaggerated cackling.

His laughter fades although the smile remains, stretched across his face and making him look young and boyish in the late afternoon light that’s shining through the curtains. Felicity gazes up at her father, eyes alight, as he leans forward and touches his nose to hers.

Much like their eyes, their curls are the same colour, and they mingle together as he whispers, “I love you, my beautiful girl.”

* * *

He kisses her forehead before he goes somewhere without her, whether it be to another room in the house or to work, grasping her little hands tight in his as he crouches down. She always watches him leave.

Every time, without fail.

* * *

She is eight years old, and her father is gone.

She sits on a stool at the Grand, hair tied back tight and glasses slipping down her nose as she leans over a book.

“Jesus.” She hears one of the regular patrons say, “I’m surprised Donna can even _look_ at her, she looks so much like him.”

The hair-tie snaps painfully against her wrist as Felicity lets her hair down. She won’t let them see her cry.

* * *

She’s twelve years old, and she’s just made her mother cry for the first time.

They’d been fighting, on and off, for a while now. Around 5 months, if Felicity had to estimate. But it had really peaked tonight. One moment Donna is dropping her handbag on the couch, asking Felicity about her homework and whether she could help-knowing full well that she probably couldn’t- the next Felicity’s throat was raw from yelling, and her mother’s cheeks were streaked with tears.

Felicity slumps against the bathroom door and lets out a shuddering breath. A part of her itches to run downstairs and apologize, say she didn’t mean the horrible things she said and beg forgiveness. But another part of her… doesn’t. The same part that felt an almost vicious pleasure when her mother was left gaping and speechless at her barbs.

That scares her. That she can feel such things.

She looks up and meets her own eyes in the mirror. Her face is red, eyes a little glassy; and her hair is wild as it frames her face, curls knotted and frizzy. Her shoulders are tense and her hands are clenched into fists, shaking uncontrollably at her side.

She looks dangerous.

In the blink of an eye she’s crossed the small space to the basin, wrenching the drawer under the sink open and snatching out the large pair of scissors kept there.

Felicity meets her own eyes in the mirror again and, without breaking eye contact, brings the scissors to her hair.

*

Donna finds her the next morning. She’s curled in the bathtub, eyes red and hollow. More than 14 inches of hair clutters the floor and is clogging the basin along with the broken shards of the mirror. The scissors also lie in the sink, where they had presumably fallen after Felicity had driven them into the reflective glass.

Donna asks why she’d cut her hair. Felicity says nothing. When Donna then asks why she’d broken the mirror, Felicity just runs her hand through her now messy pixie cut and says;

“I look even more like him now.”

* * *

She is thirteen years old, and her hair is red.

Not ginger red. _Red_ , red. Like a fire truck. On one side its cut at a sharp angle, longest end almost touching her chin, the other side is feathery and barely covers the tip of her new industrial piercing. Her natural dark brown is creeping at the roots, and she’s thinking maybe she will try going ginger for a while; when she hears the call,

“Yo Smoak! Quit daydreaming, we got work to do!”

Riley Williams, Las Vegas High’s newest trouble-maker; as well as one of her best friends, grins wickedly at her and hands her a baseball bat. The blue streaks in her hair glow and in the moonlight she looks both maniacal and ethereal and god, Felicity thinks she might love her, just a little.

That night they share their first kiss; grinning against the other’s lips. Felicity’s hair glows like fire, but her blush burns hotter as Riley whispers goodnight in her ear before spinning on her heel and stalking off into the night.

Felicity lets her head fall back against the front door of her house and thinks that she could get used to this.

* * *

Riley punches an off duty cop and is sent upstate to a juvenile detention center. The back of Felicity’s head and lips burn from where Riley had pulled her in for one last, desperate kiss. Felicity looks at herself in the reflection of her window; looks at how the raindrops distort her features but do nothing to dim the brightness of her hair.

She skips school the next day. Comes home to her mother’s disappointed glare and weary sigh. Listens to her mutter about how she looks like a bruise with her hair black and blue.

* * *

She’s sixteen when she leaves Vegas.

Felicity is one of the only ones on the rickety old bus as it lurches down the empty desert road. She sits at the back, looking out the rear window. The city is quickly shrinking behind her. It’s the middle of the day and without the neon lights blaring Felicity thinks that the City of Sin looks dull and unattractive. Although it had looked that way to her for years now.

Her reflection mars her vision as the city shrinks, her hair is still black, but the streaks are pink and turquoise now.

She dyed it right after she received her MIT acceptance letter.

* * *

She’s eighteen, and goddamn late for class.

Cursing in four different languages alternatively; Felicity rounds yet another corner, boots striking loudly against the linoleum as she strides down the hallway. Stupid Riley, keeping her up half the night as they talked on the phone, next time Felicity sees that ugly mug she’s going to knock her fucking teeth i-

“Whoa!”

If she doesn’t accidently break her neck walking into strangers first that is.

Rubbing her head from her position on the floor she squints up at the guy she had smashed into and…well that’s just great. He’s cute, double embarrassment points for Felicity. Woop woop.

Grinning adorably, Cute Guy holds out his hand, pulling her to her feet and wincing slightly as he says, “Sorry ‘bout that.”

Felicity instantly blushes, snatching her hand away before blurting, “I’m pretty sure it was my fault. I’m really sorry it’s just my friend is a jerk and we were talking for ages last night and then I remembered this paper that I had to finish so I only got like two hours sleep and I was only going to be a _little_ bit late for class but Mr Davies is kind of a prick and didn’t even bother emailing us that class had been moved to the other side of the freaking campus and wow I’m rambling aren’t I? So I’m just gonna…stop doing that… sorry?” Felicity finishes, out of breath and flushed with embarrassment and… wow…. Cute Guy sure can _smile_.

Grin wide and eyes sparkling, he holds out his hand,

“Hi, I’m Cooper.”

* * *

She’s nineteen, and considering not even bothering going to class today.

Felicity tosses her head to the side, throwing her purple and black hair across her face, as she arches off the mattress and moans. Cooper’s tongue tracing her belly button piercing as he makes his way slowly up and down her torso, teasing her mercilessly.

“You’re such a- oh- dick, you know that right?” Felicity gasps, sharply digging her black fingernails into his hair.

Cooper grimaces at that, shaking his head to try and dislodge her “And _you’re_ feral.” He retorts when he doesn’t succeed.

She grins down at him, “You love it.” She counters.

His disappointed sigh is ruined by his smile. “I do.” He concedes, sliding up her body fully and peppering kisses over her face and across her jawline.

(Felicity tries not to linger on how her stomach drops uneasily at those two little words. As if to shake off the apprehension settling deep in her bones she thrusts her hips up, and thoughts are soon blissfully unnecessary.)

* * *

After Cooper dies she doesn’t leave his old dorm for four days.

Myron stops by a few times, looking at her sadly and asking if she’s okay and if she needs anything before heading back to his boyfriend’s place.

(“You’re welcome to come with me you know.” He says softly, as if she’s going to turn back into the sobbing, screaming mess she was when she first found out about Cooper, “Jordan won’t mind. I’m pretty sure he adores you more than me sometimes.”

Myron’s gentle smile slips off his face as she doesn’t reply and just clutches the plushie panda tighter, and she wishes his disappointed huff as he leaves would break through her numb shell)

* * *

Finally Myron does get through to her. And it’s as Felicity is stuffing her pair of cargo pants into the trash bag, shredding her former identity; that she’s hit with a sudden sense of déjà vu. But that’s impossible. She’s done anything like this before, has she?

Felicity shakes her head, attributing it to the pungent smell of dye that’s currently overwhelming her senses, and heads to the bathroom to wash it out.

* * *

She likes the low ponytail. Coupled with her sweaters and knee length skirts, people’s eyes tend to drift over her, and that’s fine. She likes being able to throw herself into her work without any distractions. To go home to her new townhouse, that is sparsely decorated and very, very empty.

She’s alone yes, but not lonely.

Right?

* * *

She’s almost twenty three, and there’s a red pen between her teeth.

“Felicity Smoak? Hi, I’m Oliver Queen.”

* * *

The hot water burns her back, unraveling her elegant curls and breaking through the slight haze of alcohol.

Her hands linger at her neck. She can still feel the cold metal of the bomb collar pressed against it if she focuses hard enough. But the fact that she almost died tonight is not the only thing gnawing at her.

It’s the fact that the adrenaline still coursing through her is not only a result of fear, but of excitement.

* * *

“Adrenaline junkie. Just like her father.” The patrons of the Grand used to whisper about her. Glaring at her multi-coloured hair and often bandaged hands.

* * *

She loves poker.

It’s a cliché, sure. A kid from the city of sin being able to clear the table and wipe the smug smiles off the faces of the idle rich. Her petite figure drawing eyes but disregarding any potential wariness. Her painted lips and dress are literal red herrings, and Felicity likes that. Likes the subtle manipulation of people’s assumptions about her as much as she likes the familiar buzz of a casino, the flick of the cards, the clatter of poker chips.

She’s nervous and more than a little embarrassed about her verbal gaffe with Oliver earlier (what else is new?) but she’s enjoying herself. She’d hated a lot of things about Vegas, but the gambling? It had always been a highlight. A diamond of fun shining in a sea of glitter and cheap alcohol.

But all the excitement is sucked from her blood like water down a drain as the smoke of the exploding arrow clogs her lungs and Dominic Alonzo confirms that Walter Steele is dead.

* * *

Oliver Queen had walked into her office seven months ago with a smile and a bad lie. The sun had been shining and his laugh had been light like the outside breeze.

Now, the world falls apart around her, bits of stone hitting her back painfully; but she keeps her cries silent, listening to Oliver sobbing over his best friend’s body.

When the rumbling temporarily creases and all she can hear through the comns is little, devastating hiccups, she throws the earpiece onto the desk and buries her face in her hands.

* * *

Felicity is still bruised and about seventeen different kinds of fucked and almost all of them have something to do with the way Oliver Queen is looking at her over the bottle of wine they’re currently sharing.

He’s broken and tired but he still insisted on bringing her the bottle of wine he promised her months ago. (Felicity, somehow, had held her tongue and not blurted that since he’s the one suffering from the death of his best friend and the incarceration of his mother _he_ is the one that should be drinking, not her) So now Felicity is kinda drunk and definitely fucked (and not in a good way) because she’s pretty sure she’s half in love with this beautiful, tragic man who she can never be with and can’t stop wondering if the faraway look in his eyes means what she thinks it does.

She wakes up on the couch the next morning, a little hung-over and still sore, and just knows.

He’s left. He’s gone.

* * *

Due to the earthquake she doesn’t have to work for a while. At Queen Consolidated, that is.

So she spends most of her time either alone or with Diggle, fixing up the Foundry or searching for Oliver. She spends most of it in faded jeans and a revolving door of ratty t-shirts. (Diggle raises his eyebrows at more than a few of the designs on them; but Felicity can’t find it in her to feel embarrassed over clothing she bought up to ten years ago.) So when she’s finally due back at her real (read: legal) job and has to pick out an outfit to wear the next day she just sorta… blanks.

That is if blank is synonymous with panic attack. One minute she’s selecting a pink, long sleeved sweater from her closet and the next she’s on the floor next to her bed; the air sucked out of her lungs and her cheeks wet, staining the carpet in an array of patterns due to the jerky movements of her fear driven convulsions.

The sweater lies in her peripheral, taunting her with how similar it is to the clothing she wore when the Glades fell.

She reaches up and digs her fingernails into the back of her neck and it is only when she feels the warm trickle of blood that she finally calms down. Her neck stings as she cleans it, but anything is better than the phantom pains of rubble hitting her back as the city was torn apart.

* * *

Felicity trades the sweaters and knee length skirts for dresses that are tight and more revealing. She straightens her hair, something she hasn’t done since college, and starts wearing it down more. She looks good, great even.

Almost nothing like her scared reflection in the cracked computer screens months ago.

She scrubs viciously at her scalp as if the she can scratch the Count’s fingerprints from her skin. The pounding of the shower water on tile echoes the throb of her head and drowns out her sobs and the feeling of her hair being pulled out and wrapped around her fingers.

She scrapes at her head, and hopes she looks different when the fog clears.

* * *

“I love you.” He says and god, for a second she believes him. Believes this tragic man and his beautiful blue eyes as he declares his love for her the same way she had once believed another.

The syringe is cold against her palm and her heart is slumped with disappointment as she watches him leave. He’s going to war. He’s heading to work.

Felicity sits on the staircase in Queen Manor and wonders when she’ll love and not be lied to and left in return.

* * *

She starts to believe him, little by little. She cups his face and grins at him; promises him he’ll be ‘corporate master of the universe’ by the time she’s done with him and tries not to hope that he’ll be something more.

She says yes to dinner.

She’s left speechless by his honesty, and this time when she drowns in his eyes it’s by the flicker of candlelight and not in the darkness of a mansion.

* * *

The world lights up in fire. When she wakes there is blood and soot in her hair and the pain emanating from her head is nothing compared to that of her heart.

She already knows what he’s going to do to her. The same thing they always do.

Leave

* * *

Oliver cups her face and kisses her in the hospital hallway. His hands are so large that his fingers rest in her hair and a part of her wishes she could stay in the blissful oblivion that is the moment right before he pulls away. Before he speaks and suddenly she’s wishing that she didn’t… care for him as much as she does.  But god she does, and now, standing in a hospital hallway she wishes her heart was a sterile as; she’s more conflicted than ever about what to do.

A part of wants to yell at him, to scream in his face that she doesn’t fucking deserve this; to be jerked around like some broken little toy. A part of her wants to kiss him, hard and passionate, to convince him he’s wrong; that they can have this, even if only for a little while. She wants to do both, she wants it all.

She settles for being the one who walks away this time.

* * *

“Your hair is so long.” Sara says in wonder and Felicity hums contentedly in lieu of actual response.

They’re resting on the couch, Felicity’s head in Sara’s lap as the older woman cards her fingers through Felicity’s hair. They’re surrounded by empty takeout boxes and the now silent T.V paints a myriad of moving colours on their skin. There’s an empty bottle of wine by Sara’s feet and Felicity is feeling deliciously floaty. Not drunk, far from it in fact, just blurry around the edges. Felicity likes that, likes her brain being coddled in cotton instead of running a million miles an hour.

Suddenly Sara digs her fingers into Felicity’s scalp, massaging it gently and Felicity moans, arching like a cat into her soft yet firm touch.

Sara chuckles after a pause, but Felicity can hear tenseness to the tone that wasn’t there earlier. Opening her eyes to stare up at her, Felicity asks “What’s wrong?”

Tongue darting out to wet her lips, Sara replies “You remember what I told you about that… arrangement Nyssa and I have?”

Felicity does remember. But what does that have to do with…oh.

“Yeah?” Felicity breathes.

Sara leans down slightly; her free hand intertwining with one of Felicity’s on her stomach, and starting to drag _down_.

“Yeah.” Sara confirms, before leaning down all the way and kissing her softly.

Their hands stay intertwined the entire time.

* * *

Rubbing the cool washcloth over her palms and scrubbing gently in-between her limp fingers, Felicity cleans Sara’s small and oh so cold hands meticulously.  Sitting rigid in the hard metal chair next to the med table, she cleans her friend’s lifeless hands for what seems like hours; eyes glassy yet tears not falling.

When she gets a text message from Oliver saying he’ll be at the foundry in an hour she places the washcloth back in the bowl of water and grasps Sara’s -jesus, her _tiny_ \- left hand in both of her own and stares blankly at her lifeless face.

Sixteen years since her father left her; it’ll be seventeen when she turns 25 in a few weeks. And for not the first time Felicity wonders why losing someone you love and never seeing it coming doesn’t get easier the more it happens. Surely, she thinks, if there’s one thing that should be easy by now, it’s this.

She intertwines Sara’s dead fingers with her own, and wishes she would squeeze back one last time.

* * *

“I just decided I wanted more out of life.”

Her hair is shorter and wavy around her shoulders, but still long enough that she can hide behind it if need be. So it’s easier to pretend she doesn’t see the sad understanding in Ray Palmer’s eyes as she signs the contract placed it front of her. Easier to pretend that being his EA or whatever the hell he’s hiring her to be will make her happy. It’s easier to focus on the weight of the pen instead of the phantom pressure of Sara’s dead hand.

It’s easier to pretend that she’s okay when she’s really, really not.


End file.
